Trans-Patch
by Mnesia
Summary: A continuation of Trans-Meowstic, a Pokémon transformation tale taking place in the real world. This time, we follow Nick, heir to the esteemed Wright wealth and manor, but with a slightly different outlook on things than his absent family. Nothing is quite as it seems in this mansion. It could be said that his time here is... short-lived?


**_Whaddup_**

 ** _I know I haven't done a whole lot on this site. Heck, I even said I wouldn't come back, but here I am with a continuation of Trans-Meowstic._**

 ** _Just something I wanted to get back into the swing of. Dumb fun is all. Hope you guys enjoy!_**

* * *

 _ **Trans-Patch**_

 _ **A story involving a bit of transformation,**_

 _ **continuing from Trans-Meowstic.**_

 **Let's cut the chatter.**

"Your move," I said.

"Hm?" he looked up from his phone.

I raised a brow, pushing my glasses in with my pointer finger.

He looked to the chessboard, his own pointer finger still touching the glowing screen of his phone.

His eyes appeared lost as they glossed over the field, darting from a1 to h8 – his rook and my rook – ah, but my rook was elsewhere, and it'd taken him a concerning moment too long to figure it out.

"Castled?" he asked, eyes locked onto my king.

I couldn't help but feel pride welling up inside of me – and not for myself, but for him.

"There you go," I said. "Now, why did I castle?"

"Uhh..." he droned over, taking a moment to turn his entire body to the board. Phone still in hand, he hung his free hand over the small, round table, haplessly opening and closing his fist.

 _Bishop,_ I thought to tell him. The piece was well within range of my king previously, and I'd done very little to suggest that was intentional for his sake. Truth be told, he had hardly realized his bishop was there to begin with. Even one turn from checkmate, his lack of interest was contagious.

Like an arcade crane game, he took said bishop between finger and thumb, lifting the helpless little figurine from the board. It all seemed to play in slow motion, the poor object delegated to 'be' on behalf of a tactless mind. Without warning or aim, the piece was fated to be moved and changed by the hands of someone who, quite honestly, had no idea where to go from here. And I had orchestrated all of it. Like a change in time signature, my pride went to rags, and the rags went unclean.

 _What the hell am I even thinking?_

 _I shouldn't get too into this._

"Johnny," I sighed, furrowing my brows. Leaning forward on my stool, I watched my peer's focus shift from the board to me, attentive and apprehensive all the same. "You need to 'want' it."

"I'm sorry?" he asked, feeble.

"If I'm going to teach you the complexities of this game," I folded my hands, laying my elbows near the corners of the board. "Then you'll need to actually put the effort in to learn. Like learning to play an instrument, you can't expect the learning to happen for you."

"Um, but sir, can't you just play every instrument...?" he pondered aloud – 'aloud', because the thought was as aimless as his bishop was destined to be some place outside of the game.

"Irrelevant;" I furrowed my brow again. "Besides, I don't play every instrument. I can't sing."

The thought of using this pitch-stricken, monotone curse of a voice for anything other than lecture was romantic, if not a reminder of the pressure in my chest that kept me from such a desire; and now, Johnny had put me in this vulnerable position, if by accident.

"But I've heard you hum," he carried on. "You sound good!"

"Please stop with this subject," I said, suppressing the urge to bury my face into my hands and tell him that overzealous endearment was not the way to win my praise. "And let's continue with the match."

"If I may, um, sir," he announced. "I think you should really take Sheffield's suggestion. You're... clearly not happy."

This was embarrassing. Had word done me the discourtesy of spreading so far that even Johnny built the gall to strike at my crumbling wall of depression with a wrecking ball? Was this game of chess a means to an end for him to tell me that I should have done something for myself, rather than for him? I scoffed audibly.

"Is that what this is about?" I asked. He stared in nervous silence.

Several attempts at choir. Several attempts at keeping up with that protein-guzzling Cruce. They all resulted in the same heaving pressure, throat scorched dry by all the coughing, the taste of blood. It seemed like all of the square feet of property my family owned was to shelter naught but an asthmatic husk to whom others had increasing interest in his frailty. It merely stank of pity and served only to make the pressure worse – that it was an illusion anyway.

I could reel over it. And it might have killed me, but so too would my own voice.

"You're here for the money," I said, forcefully curt. "I would appreciate it if you avoided sensitive topics by way of wasting our time. A little bit of selfishness is good for you, you know."

"For the money...?" his jaw went wide. "Mister Wright, I-...!"

Nothing else needed to be said, much less something that would have crossed the line. Johnny was never one to do that, and part of me was intrigued to see what it was like to make him upset. I couldn't even recall the last time he'd raised his voice at me. Luring him into punishment was not all that different from our pointless game on the table; I pulled the strings that he didn't even know he had.

The backlash never came, and I still found myself speaking as though it did, if not just to hear my voice's phantasmal dynamism.

"I'm going to dismiss you for now," I blanketed the silence. "Please help Sheffield with the rehearsal room. It's not a one-man job, and I'm sure the shelves haven't been dusted yet."

"Right away, sir," he answered dejectedly, avoiding eye contact and promptly turning in his stool with such force that an unpleasant creak assaulted the rec room's hardwood floor. Clumsily pinching up the corners of his black collar with his available hand, the shine of his phone compelled a further breath out of me.

"Leave your phone here, please," I demanded.

"Uh-...?" he froze, finally showing me the frustration in his eyes. Flustered, and likely before his mind fully processed the request, his body was already in the motion of leaving the phone on the table.

"Good," I chirped, sparing him any condescending smile. "The ADD won't have the edge anymore, don't you think?"

Sullen, his is hand retreated from the sides of the phone. Calling his own chronological flaw, he seemed defeated. It was my aim. I hadn't the patience to wallow in conversation about my own weakness; rather, I would have reminded him of his own. This was his place, metaphorically and literally, as was soon demonstrated by the phone in my possession. He walked away, and with it, my curiosity saw an arm reaching across the abandoned battlefield to a screen that'd just gone dark.

Lighting the freshly purchased device, I thought to examine what had taken Johnny's attention so voraciously after all the passion he'd shown me for chess. I was never one for timing, but I seemed to have encroached upon a string of messages between he and a friendly contact; a chess club enthusiast, from what I recalled, so the connection quickly became obvious.

Moreover, my interest piqued on part of a selection of expensive inhalers that he had been perusing. In his haste, he had neglected to close the browser, and I found perusing it. My fingers clenched as the list only seemed to drag on, the numbers listed under each product growing in size. One primal reaction within me screamed above them all. _You don't need it,_ it said. _It's a sign of weakness, and you are a Wright, and weakness is wrong._

For fear that I would have damaged Johnny's device in my clutching hand, I left well enough alone, meticulously placing the phone the same way it'd been left by his own hands. I still stared at it from across the chessboard; a battle frozen in time, both sides manipulated in part by me.

Only now, after Johnny was gone, did I feel like I had lost.

 _What's a battle without a war,_ I thought. _What's a war without death?_

 _I shouldn't have to feel this way, like death has any right to haunt me now..._

…

 **Later that night**

This weekend was as impotent as the many others before it. I could only lay under this glass room open to the stars above a town blessed beyond light pollution and ponder how exactly it looked to the rest of the family. I was left at the liberty of a mansion's long hallways, where voices would echo like ghosts; left to enjoy each and every room of it as I saw fit, save the butlers' pantry, of course.

 _A promise,_ I thought, tracing make-believe constellations with the temple tips of my glasses. A blurred vision made it all the more convincing – dark was still dark, even blurred, and lights were much more abrasive. It made another of my weaknesses feel... fanciful. _One day, they'll all come back, and this place will no longer be wasted on me._

I studied class subjects frivolously in our library. I did homework assignments in the den. I struck key after key of the grand piano in the foyer. I spent hours tuning each and every stringed instrument in the audio rehearsal room – Sheffield truly had earned his wage for tidying that place up. In spite of it all, I could never even sleep in my own bedroom, despite the grandiose comfort of a double bed with impossibly soft blankets laced with the kind of fluff I suspected everybody had a weakness for. I chose the least pleasant futon in a room that was more suited for observational study.

Perhaps it was so because of how far over my head certain things were. The things that my family had told me in times of anguish – _"Fine arts are frivolity, sciences are integrity."_ No some-hundred haphazard star patterns enlightened me enough to make sense of the cold, hard truth of it all; but it was right here in my own body. Arts? Song? Leisure – all of this was meant for entertainment, and that was meant to stay at home. Wealth may have bought the means necessary to produce the fine arts, but the fine arts did not produce the wealth. Not for the Wrights.

I didn't give any less of a damn about the technology this family had went and conceived. Revolutionize tactical combat, domestic security, and espionage?

"Pah," I spat, the motion forceful enough to make me lose my place with the tip of my glasses. I squinted into the night sky, mindful of the imperfection.

To be told by one father what kind of progeny I was, then to be told by another father where my affluence was to earned... I'd needed goddamn pressure compensation just to comprehend just how deep it had struck, as my own body even told me what was and what wasn't off limits. Why not let the doctors help? I was sure we owned at least three of them in this rural dustpan of a town. Oh! How could I forget? That thing inside of me chaining up all of my melodious outcry? Weakness. Even the fail-safe which kept me from the fine arts wasn't valid enough conversation for anyone.

I hated how much I agreed, and the more I hated it, the more I was driven to reject it; and the more I rejected it, the more it showed to everybody around me. The more they cared...

Odd. Inside of me was a ghost only wanting to cry out. Inside of the house were the instruments of 'frivolity', never to be taken out. Was it a sick joke, then? Did they all know how fitting this place was for me? Was it a punishment of some kind?

No. If it was a punishment, they wouldn't have left me with Sheffield and Johnny. As much as it made both rows of teeth press each other, their concern was met with outstretched arms by that little ghost in me, while the stone-faced shell I wore shooed them away with handiwork and distractions.

And so, a thought occurred to me, and then the thought escaped me.

"I'll apologize tomorrow, on the way to school," I said, hesitation breaking the consonants apart unnaturally. "Yeah, that's... decent of me."

But pride was nowhere to be found in it. I let the arm in possession of my glasses fall to my side, extended, landing with quiet thump onto the blanketed futon. Instead of the clarity of good mannerisms and decency, I thought of little else other than the tiny speckles of light just beyond the glass, or the constant need for others to ask me why I attended some crusty public high school when I could have gone off to the greatest educational institutes money and notoriety could afford. On behalf of the social experiment I'd found myself playing the role of, I felt it best to stay quiet and give mean looks.

The quiet found its way into my head, and some clumsy shuffling through soft fabric after that, my eyes closed, and a quiet embrace soon had me. Falling asleep was the easiest it had ever been. It was as a cotton embrace...

…

 **Somewhere in the quiet of sleep**

 _Business model? Buy-in investment programs?_

I was wearing some kind of costume. It wasn't Halloween, and there was no other such special occasion. The costume fit me, but I couldn't help but feel disproportionate to everybody else, and furthermore, I couldn't answer why.

 _Trying to come up with SOMETHING that sounds smart. What would he like?_

I was being pulled somewhere, but it wasn't that there were hands pulling me. I deduced that hands were the only things in the universe that could pull. No gravity. No pressure.

I was almost okay with this...

 _Who the hell put him here anyway? Sure wasn't his parents! Wasn't me either, 'cause I inherited all of this._

 _It's just here..._

I was sitting down. I was out of breath, but the pressure was all gone. I was sitting, and for once, it didn't feel like something heavy was sitting on me.

 _I'm sitting there._

All around me were unfamiliar faces, all looking at me, soulless, beady and bug-eyed. I looked at the soft ground and my feet weren't even there.

 _Just where it feels so right. I see why he likes it._

 _I wonder when he'll realize...!_

Somewhere other, there was a king and a rook, side by side. Strangely, the king began to assume the form of a bishop. Its role had changed, and yet somehow, it was still the same.

I felt detached, like my body was off doing one thing and my mind was thinking another – but that mind was in a different physical place. When I realized I was surfacing from a meaningless dream, I heard the pitter-patter of rain.

…

 **Six in the morning**

When I awoke, it was not to a clear sky, but to cloud cover, rain tapping against the observatory's glass roof. Déjà vu plucked at me like a guitar pick. A pained sensation claimed the region around my forehead and eyes, brightness of the clouded daylight assailing me. Shutting my eyes and opening them repeatedly, I tossed to one side, then the other, hand scrambling for my glasses. I pinched the lens binding, turned my wrist, and held the object up above my nose, pushing it into place. I looked high, and each and every raindrop became lucid. Streaks of clear water ran the bulbous roof. The lining of differently layered clouds appeared clearer.

The strain of heavy eyelids still plagued me, but it was all the less agitating behind the transition lenses. All that was left to contend with was the weight of the 'waking' world, and the dream that meant so little to me my memory washed it away. I sat with my back hunched, instinctively turning to the place I'd left my phone – namely, the floor, a chord sloppily draped over the carpet. I reached for it, tapping the button just beneath the screen, but...

A few quick, gentle knocks.

"Young Master Wright," came an elderly gentleman's voice, muffled from behind the door. "Pardon my intrusion; are you awake?"

He was trying to hide urgency beneath his accented voice. Then, it had only just occurred to me that the alarm I had set did not go off. Only further then, my phone never activated. By what light there was above, I could still deduce that it was my 'favorite' time of the morning.

"Sheffield, come on in," I instructed him. The doorknob shook, and the suit-clad butler stepped in, promptly lifting his chin and orienting both gloved hands behind his back.

"Good morning, young sir," he addressed me. "I'm afraid to inform you that the town's power grid has failed, leaving us with a blackout."

"Right," I said, rolling and popping my neck. "Again? This is a bit strange, isn't it?"

"Quite," the upraised man said. "Would I have your permission to bring the generator out?"

"By all means," I said. Why hadn't he already done that? Was it to ensure it didn't wake me? "Sheffield, did Father say anything to you about the solar panel contractors?"

"No sir, he has not," he answered, concise.

"Okay," I grunted, pushing both fists into the futon. I stood, but perhaps too quickly, and my balance was taken for a hazy head. I'd corrected myself, both arms out to one side, but Sheffield had already come in close to assist me. I saw a white glove on my shoulder.

"Young Master," he chuckled. "WHAT'S HAPPENED TO YOU?!"

 _What?!_

I blinked twice, gasped once. Sheffield was guiding me off of the futon. My breathing was hurried! My hands balled up again. I was staring at our beloved family butler, his eyes narrowing through his round glasses; but other than that, all seemed well with him.

"Is something the matter, young sir? Overexerted yourself this early, have we?" he asked, as if his voice hadn't all but exploded onto me. Thinking back those few seconds, I even hallucinated the spit flying from his mouth, the red in his eyes...

"No," I heard myself say. Frustration claimed the space in my mind prepared for confusion. "I'm going to help you."

"Heavens, no – with respect, young sir, I must decline your aid," he said.

"I'd like the walk, at the very least," I asserted, fighting back a yawn, pressing a fist to my mouth. "I... can't seem to wake up, so..."

"Mm?" he waited for me to finish. "Ah, if it is but a morning walk, then that is all well."

…

With some hint of reluctance, Sheffield accepted my request to join him across several flights of stairs in the dark. Despite the unsettling openness of it all, this man several times my age, balding and wrinkled, walked through hallway after hallway with his arms behind his back, speaking to me all the while! My chest shrieked with fatigue after just the first two flights of stairs. I said nothing on its behalf; however, he found the most annoyingly perfect time to raise the suggestion that Johnny so abrasively paraded last night.

Though the rooms had changed, the scenery remained similar. Raindrops drizzled against a glass roof, sliding down, creating the illusion of wet cracks in a glass corridor overlooking a distant orange and green canopy. It was much further down the mountain, some of the greenery blocking out the view, but ensuring that our unsightly glass tube didn't put itself forth too loudly to onlookers. To think someone down there somewhere could have seen me in my ragged pajamas if they looked hard enough. In this weather, distance was misty. Maybe that was lucky.

"Now I know I am stepping on hallowed ground," Sheffield started. "But I am seriously concerned for your health, young sir. Your condition seems to be getting worse."

"God..." I sighed through my teeth, throwing a hand through my hair. "Won't I grow out of it?"

"Well, I seem to remember it being a momentum-based battle," he claimed. "And right now, you do not have the momentum."

"What can I do...?" I said, not so much asking as just letting the question fall out of me.

"If I may be so bold," he began – I already didn't like it. "Your ventures with your friends in the woods – perhaps not every day? And, young Master, please do consider an inhaler. I understand how strongly you feel about conserving your image, but that image would not be so brilliant in a hospital bed."

It was like a dark cave with no way out. I knew he was right. Still, I wanted to be there. I wanted to try and scrape at that juvenile need for exploration. Why did it have to change? Why did _I_ have to change?

Then, before I could protest, Johnny, still buttoning his collared shirt, came sprinting through us. His footsteps made no noise, and despite seeing his mouth move briefly, no noise came from him. Most notably, he passed completely through Sheffield. I sucked in air loudly, clutching a hand to my chest. My heart raced as quickly as Johnny had run off to who-knew-where. He vanished into the approaching greenhouse.

Another hand on my shoulder – not my own. My back arched. My lungs felt lined with lead. Sheffield was supporting me.

"Oh my days!" the normally composed man exclaimed. I shook my head.

"No, wait-!" I cleared my throat with little patience. It burned. "It's not—this isn't—it's-!"

The words all seemed to metamorphose into coughs and wheezes. Those beckoned more, until my whole chest felt as though it was becoming buried in cement. I was only startled! I wanted to shout to Sheffield that it WASN'T what he assumed!

"Johnny," I managed to excavate from within me. "Did you not see that, Sheffield? Was it just me?!"

"I beg your pardon?" he asked, looking away – looking out the window. I gestured forward with a bob of my head. "The greenhouse?"

…

The inner yard, I called it, not because it was a greenhouse, but because the mountainside plateaued smooth enough for a second backyard to wrap around the glass-cased, humid domain; albeit this yard fell more on the wild side. Maintenance fell upon outsourced gardeners and landscapers – ultimately, Sheffield and Johnny already had their hands full shooing off the local population of squirrels.

Well, for the time being, Sheffield had his hands full with me, and Johnny was occupied being... ethereal. Roughly explaining my situation to our butler and growing ever wearier to persuade him I was okay, we passed through the crisp scents of white and black sage in the cool morning. Beyond the murky veil of tinted glass, I could already make out a few fluffy tails flicking in the grass. The buggers were cute and fun to chase, bud had I at 'em nowadays, I may've fallen a few skips short of passing out in the sun.

"It hadn't even the chance of collecting dust," Sheffield spoke. I (my shoulders, at the very least) jumped.

"We could always move it to the cellar," I offered, stepping around Sheffield to eye over the generator – a tiny thing wrapped in its own thick, colorful cabling. Not too much voltage, but it was the lightest one we had, and it could still power the building for a good few hours.

"A suggestion to consider, if the outages continue! Hup-hup we go," he mused, comically clapping his hands together twice before leaning down to hoist the machine by one of its bars. I took initiative, moving to the opposite side, following Sheffield's movements until he stopped in place and squinted at me. "Oh, now, we can't have you doing heavy lifting, too..."

I was brought back to a moment spent in a weight training room, sweat on my brow, back against a bench, a barbell before me. I looked the part of a damn fool before I'd even touched the thing. In the moment, I had turned to my left, vision partially blocked by support apparatuses, to see Cruce and his effeminate cousin aiding one another in their own bench press. Cruce wasn't even the one benching.

" _I'll_ consider the inhaler suggestion," I paused, wrapping one hand around the metal bar-casing. "If you and I can make it back the way we came with this without fussing over my... detriment."

I hated to think that, sooner or later, I would have had to threaten Sheffield with emotional trifles just to get him into the position I wanted, and probably for no more than the deterioration of my own health, because that tiny trek with what was supposed to be the tiniest generator we owned was as brisk and brutal a self-fulfilling prophecy could have been.

…

The sound of the generator's whirring became distant, drowned out behind a closed door and a running tap. Amber lighting decorated the vast bathroom with memories of mornings spent vying against the dregs of sand in my eyes. Puffing out my cheeks and swishing the spearmint mouthwash therein, I threw lukewarm water onto my face. Phantasmagoria and an aching chest were two things I'd not thought to prepare for before school. Strange that one of them seemed to rely upon the other...

I kept my wet hands over my face, breaths hot against my skin. Goosebumps swelled up under the hairs on my arms.

 _As soon as I pull my hands away, there will be something in the mirror. Something that doesn't fit._

 _Very well. At least hallucinations keep things interesting. Do your worst._

I let my fingers slide from my cheeks to the pathetic goatee clinging to my chin. The reflective pane of glass showed me nothing out of the ordinary – just a paranoid Sophomore.

I wiped the glossy granite counter-top with the same washcloth I'd used to dry my face. The glasses went back on. I looped my belt, fiddled with the top button of my shirt some, then turned and snatched the fedora that everyone loved to mock me over. It went over gelled hair all the same, its front bill pointed down. I may have been an easy target for fashion police, but the distraction was as welcome as any other.

Went I left the restroom, it was raining. Indoors.

I hadn't let go of the doorknob before it clicked in my head that the ceiling appeared to be producing rainwater, hardwood collecting the drops as loudly as though they fell from a great height. Smell of petrichor. Outdoors. The river in the woods right after a storm. I swallowed spit – at the very least, that tasted freshly of mint.

Everywhere I went, I found rainfall. In the foyer, the raindrops echoed. Against stretches of carpet, they sounded as drops into grass. Sheffield and Johnny had no bearing on any of this. They simply didn't exist to experience it with me, and the moment I suspected myself to be daydreaming in front of the bathroom mirror over the possibility of an illusion within it, I raised my head from what I assumed was my hands, and...

The rain was nowhere. Well, not in here. In here? In here – this was the audio recording room. Save for the sound of the gentlest feedback in an active amp, it was silent. It smelled of lemon cleaning solvent. Instruments racked on the walls – bass, sitar, shamisen, acoustic, violin. All shiny. Upright bass, piano, keyboard, racks of various wind instruments, timpani and a drum set side by side.

I was surrounded by it all, an electric guitar in my arms. My left hand was holding the fret board intently. My other was pinching a pick at the bridge, stuck on the low E string. I raised that hand, checked my watch, and I did still have some time to play, but...

"So, God," I called out casually. "Would you mind telling me what in your name is happening to my house?"

The only answer came in the form of static and buzzing through the amplifier.

I let the neck of the guitar go, its weight pulling me forward some. The strap kept it in place. I leaned back, dug through my pocket for my phone. Had I not ended up here mysteriously, I would have simply left it on a stand beside me, but the thought that I was slowly become a stranger to consciousness _and a stream thereof—_

I checked the phone, and immediately, before even providing me with a password screen, I was on a browser. On it were several expensive inhalers, the price range raising as the list went on. It was the exact same page that Johnny had been reading; only, when I noticed this, a new window opened on its own accord, before I could make in input of my own. After several seconds of loading, a single word appeared against the white, barren and broken page.

" S"

An electric pop louder than a gunshot.

The room went dark around me.

My phone stayed bright.

And only then did it all register, and I jumped from my seat, flinging the neck of the guitar up, although I could not even see its shape, only feel its weight around me. The tinnitus aftermath of the electronic burst rang heavy in my ears some time following the surge. It was difficult to tell whether or not I was even still in the same room, being flung all over the place by dislocated memory – AND whether or not that was even a problem was thanks to that memory in the first place.

I expected Sheffield or Johnny to come and get me. I just stood there surrounded by the shadows of instruments and amps, shelves and the like, until the phone's screen went black. I couldn't hear anything. I tried so hard to, until I pretended to hear the sound of rain again.

Goosebumps. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. My heart was racing and my lungs felt frigid.

The screen lit up. Thinking to take advantage of it, I took a quick breath, spun the light around my surroundings to check and see that I wasn't about to hit anything, and removed the guitar strap from my shoulder, taking the instrument and carefully leaning it against the stool.

I checked the phone. A message from...

"Topher?" I asked aloud, and then read the message. "'Awwh, unplugged, are ya?'"

Unfortunately for her, I thought little to check the message in full. I took a tense breath, found my way to the door with my phone's camera light; however, once I reached the door, the light flickered, and ultimately died, but my hand was already on the knob. And so I turned it, but instead of the thing opening as it would...

...The crack of light opened up horizontally, as if opening one's eyes – and not to a hallway at all, but to somewhere comfortable, skewed in angle.

I felt detached, like my body was off doing one thing and my mind was thinking another – but that mind was in a different physical place. When I realized I was surfacing from a meaningless dream, I heard the pitter-patter of rain.

…

 **6:00am**

When I awoke, it was not to a clear sky, but to cloud cover, rain tapping against the observatory's glass roof. Déjà vu struck me like a mallet. A pained sensation claimed the region around my forehead and eyes, brightness of the clouded daylight assailing me. Shutting my eyes and opening them repeatedly, I tossed to one side, then the other, hand scrambling for my glasses. I pinched the lens binding, turned my wrist, and held the object up above my nose... but I pushed it back slowly.

Despite the strain of heavy eyelids still plaguing me, I mustered up enough tired strength to stand. Leaning myself in the direction of the door, I was off the futon before long, hand coming in to greet the knob, turning it, opening the door, and-!

Sheffield was here. I hadn't heard any footsteps, but the man, clad in his suit and tie this early in the morning, was readily available – so much so that his hand was poised to knock at a door that had since been pulled inward.

"Oh good heavens!" the butler quipped. "Young Master Wright, good morning! Sprightly today, are we?"

"I-" I coughed, "I'm sorry – I had a nightmare."

I knew that in my head to be false. This interaction would have put the nail in the coffin for anyone stupid enough to believe that the previous moments spent with Sheffield were in my head.

"Oh, no, my good sir, that is the last thing you should apologize to me for," Sheffield said, both arms returning to his back. He offered what consoling smile a wrinkled face could offer – very much so, at that. I always found myself charmed by what he had to say. "In fact, I should apologize for the inconvenience here; the power grid has failed us again. Might I have your permission to fetch the generator?"

 _The generator,_ I said in my head along with him.

So now what? Was I going to tell him I wanted to help with the generator and play my morning sequence out the same as before? Had Sheffield any idea that he was taking the same steps as the previous 'incarnation' of this day? I began to doubt myself. I began thinking that this was a result of medication I had taken the night prior. What was it for? Memory lapses? I didn't have that. Did I? Wasn't that the point? Déjà vu again. It was like a pebble to the head, striking just shy of the temple.

"Sure," I muttered. "Yeah, that sounds... good. Where's Johnny?"

"Ah, well he's just getting dressed now," he answered.

 _That's... right. He was running through the hall, buttoning up his shirt... Was he?_

"Young... sir?" Sheffield asked of me. I hadn't noticed that my gaze fell upon his tie until he made another sound. "Are you feeling well?"

That concern was going to get as bothersome as me repeating myself. Whosoever had the idea of dropping me into a Groundhog Day story was putting their head into the jaws of the lion – or so I'd liked to have thought, if I wasn't such a frail shell of a human being.

I heard a buzz from behind. My phone, I assumed.

"Uhm-" I took a fast breath. "I'm just fine. Thank you, Sheffield. I'll... leave the generator to you."

…

I all but collapsed back into bed, knowing well that school was only within an hour and a half or so of starting, and although I was left with a fright for what the audio room presented to me, I still craved the feeling of a well-crafted instrument in my hands. If I did something differently, I would not have been forced to play out the events as they unfolded previously – well, obviously. I was in control of my own fate, no matter how distant that fate was.

Though, something did bother me above all else for the moment – yes, this tiny moment of refuge, where I could just lay back and look up into the cloudy sky, only for it to be blocked out by a phone that did, in fact, have battery life, where it did not the first time.

I attended the rumbling from before. It was a message from Topher.

"What did that message-" I paused abruptly, eyes narrowing as I brought up the text history. I did get a chuckle out of who I'd accidentally chosen instead of Topher; her cousin was right next to him on contacts and our conversations were mostly just emojis and stupid faces. I didn't even need to finish the thought verbally. Topher's message wouldn't have even been on here yet. She sent it several minutes from now.

 _But it did say something out of the ordinary. I remember being put off by it..._

 _Was it the 'whoops'? I remember the 'whoops'..._

Her latest message read, "lemme see if I can get a good scream outta you. you just gotta get over that first HUMP, then youll be singing in no time!"

Then, as if she knew exactly the pacing at which I was reading the message, the phone rumbling in my hand.

"that IS what you want, isnt it?"

I wondered how the hell Topher could A.) know I was in this kind of situation, and B.) be responsible for something like this. This was an impressively elaborate plan to try and help me vault over a weakness of mine that I was certain would only have caused me more grief. I knew Topher to be the playful type of person, but she was also incredibly idiotic. It didn't make me dislike her; if anything, I rather enjoyed the colorful trio that she, Cruce, and I made on our walks – sometimes quartet when that martial arts friend of theirs was involved.

"No, Topher knows me too well," I said to myself. "On our walks, they have to... wait for me to catch up all the time. She wouldn't do this."

I could reassure myself all I'd liked, but nothing I knew would have answered the HOW in all of this. I didn't have time to give it a second thought anyway; there was a knock at the door, notably clumsier in rhythm and volume than Sheffield.

"Nick, sir?" Johnny's muffled, naive and sheepish voice came from beyond the wooden frame. "You called me? Is everything okay?"

Did I do that? Call him?

I went to greet him at the door, phone since left on the floor. Upon pulling the door back, however, all that was there to see me was a hallway. It had the same carpeting and wall as most of our hallways – there was no reason to think otherwise. Though, this seemed to just... go on forever. Into blackness. No Johnny. No sign of it ever ending or connecting with other rooms. The darkness consumed the whole and total of what distance my poorly eyesight could manage, and with what superior eyesight the dark had, I felt it staring me back. It seemed to twist and turn the visible 'realm' of the hallway, albeit with jarring, snap-like motions, as if the hallway was trying to correct itself in brief, violent twitches.

I closed the damn door.

 _Nope._

Refuge again. All I had was this small room open to the beautifully light, drizzling world, where I could look up and feel free and safe, perhaps go to bed again and avoid dealing with early age dementia.

Meanwhile, this was already getting old.

"Johnny," I said as outwardly as my lungs allowed. I thought of a ruse to save face – I had probably just closed the door on him. "I'll need you to pretend you didn't see that."

"Uuhh, o-okay," he stammered. "You have yet to open the door though. So..."

"What-" I gave up and just yanked the door open again. Patience was wearing as thin as cellophane. Fortunately, Johnny was here, looking... rugged. He didn't even brush his hair, and his collar was all out of place. Instinctively, I reached for it, pinching both corners, then sliding my fingers along the rim of his neck. "God's sake, man, did you just wake up?"

"Perhaps!" he said. I could see a swell in his throat, indicating a hearty gulp. His cheeks were rosy. Some three kinds of cologne wafted past me. "M-Mister Nick, sir, um, sir-?"

"Oh, don't make this a 'thing'," I ordered him, padding out the creases of his shirt. "You're a butler, aren't you? You're lucky we don't make you wear a suit, like Sheffield."

"Understood, sir – sorry, sir," he nodded, vainly nervous. I did want to apologize to him for last night, but that was in a previous... illusion?

"Very well..." I leaned away from him. "Johnny, have you noticed anything strange around the manor?"

"Strange?" he queried dumbly – but at least his shirt looked nice. "Well, Sheffie did say you were acting a little odd – uh, no offense or... anything!"

 _Sheffie,_ I thought. I squinted. I'd never heard that one before...

"None... taken," I said, incredulous. "Alright. Go and help 'Sheffie' with the generator in the greenhouse."

"Right away, sir," he reply promptly, stepping away and taking a short, hesitant bow. As he was turning to walk away, I stopped him.

"Hey," I said. He froze, and, well, so did I... It should have been easy to apologize, but my tongue fought it back down. "Don't... worry about me so much, okay? I know that's in your job description, but I'll be fine. I promise. I'd like you to take care of yourself, too."

"Oh. Of course! Um..." he raised his shoulders, then his hands, somewhat oafishly tracing his collar as I'd done.

"Alright, you – off you go!" I instructed him, and like a messenger to a distraught king, he bounded away in a flutter. If only that 'king' didn't look like wholesome bollocks right about now.

 _But then if this morning simply repeats again, to what end would dressing out of these nighttime rags reach?_

…

Keeping close surveillance on my phone (and once Sheffield got the generator up and running), I returned to my bathroom to, at the very least, touch up on my face. My spine was cold, and the goosebumps never quite receded, knowing too well that some phantasmal reflection could have cropped up in the mirror, or otherwise.

I was stalling, mostly. I had sent a message to Topher and Cruce both regarding the text that the former had given me, but I had yet to hear back from them. Obviously, one message was more 'direct' than the other. If Topher really managed to slip me into some manner of psychedelic sequence, I wasn't quite sure what Cruce's place in this was. The two were as twin peas in a pod. Did Topher actually bear some ill will toward me? Was I overthinking this?

 _I... just need to plan my next move out,_ I thought. _I have no idea when or where 'Topher' might make her move on me._

 _She has an understanding of my weakness and knows exactly how to exploit it._

A rumble.

Leaning against the counter, palms flat against it, I braced myself for confusion.

It was a simple message from her this time: "Take a look behind you!"

"Don't do that," I said, disappointment and fear stiffening my body. "That's pathetically clichéd."

Returning my glasses to my face, I let out a low groan, then stalwartly checked the mirror for any trickery, but...

 _There's nothing._

I was looking back at myself, easy as that. I mean, perhaps Topher had greeted me with my own annoyance, which seemed a step up more fitting than maybe she intended.

After I had harbored a few seconds worth of doubt, all said doubt was washed away for a chilling thought, and before that thought could be translated into words, raw impulse overtook it. I turned around posthaste, twirling so quickly that I'd lost balance. I grabbed hold of the ridges of the counter—no! No grip! A tragic divide occurred in my head, but before I could make sense of it, I was already on the floor.

No, not the floor. It was grass, dewy and long. Although it was soft, the landing was not without pain flaring up in my arms, having failed to anticipate them absorbing the whole weight of my body. The moisture of the rather overgrown lawn quickly started to bleed through the fabric of my clothes.

I was still on the manor's property; in fact, I was in the yard outside of the greenhouse, the rain's cold, gentle ubiquity playing all around me.

Thanks to cemented brick walls and trees, nobody outside of the manor had to witness my sudden arrival and blunder, but I did wonder what it could have looked like for me to be 'plopped' into existence, assuming I didn't 'sleepwalk' over here. Contrary to some of that, I did actually have an audience

Hunched over and involving itself with my glasses, a little brown blur of fluff, tail high in the air, made me realize that the world around me was a tad less detailed than I would've liked it. I got to my feet, socks now soaked thanks to the weather, an approached the rodent gnawing at the nose-bridge, holding it between its tiny clawed hands. From the angle I walked, it almost looked to be wearing them.

It decided that some yards of distance was far too few, and turned its tail toward me, darting off into the uncut grass. It didn't drop the glasses. I needed to be assertive, huh? Well, that was all fine and dandy, but the shock alone from this 'transition' was closing me up inside. My heart was going, my chest squeezing in –I was going to need to treat every step with respect out here if I wanted to stay in well enough condition...

That went out the door as quickly as I had – that was to say, it was never even put into practice. The first chance I got, I threw my legs forward in a desperate run. I needed the glasses. I needed to be able to read the messages on my phone. I needed to know where things WERE so I did not TRIP and FALL into the MUD! Air rushing by me as I hopped back up, I pursued the brown tail across every corner of the yard, until it had finally given up and discarded the glasses at the base of an old tree. Taking short, agonized breaths, I threw myself to my knees, palms grazing the blades of grass for any object that seemed out of place.

I gave up partway through – at least with one hand, as it shot against my chest and clutched hard. My diaphragm was burning. It felt like my ribs were clawing at my lungs. My breaths turned into shorter, whistling wheezes. My head started to hurt with each cough, but in the commotion my body presented to me, my free hand skimmed over something hard and wiry. Fingers knowing all too well the shape of the item, they fluttered and turned the object, until I knew they were pointed for my face. I pressed the glasses against me, and though they were meant to fix my eyesight everything seemed to go dark.

At this point, I could still feel the tightness asphyxiating me, but I couldn't cough. I could imagine the sounds of strain and tearing in my muscles – somehow. I didn't know. I just thought of something horrible and that would have been what it was. I didn't want these thoughts anymore. I felt...

...detached, like my body was off doing one thing and my mind was thinking another – but that mind was in a different physical place. When I realized I was surfacing from a meaningful dream, I once again heard the pitter-patter of rain.

…

 **6am**

When I awoke, rain was tapping against the observatory's glass roof. Déjà vu blared at me like a siren. A familiar tightness sensation claimed my chest, as the brightness of the clouded daylight assailed me. Shutting my eyes and opening them repeatedly, I homed in on where my glasses were and put them on. Again.

The phone.

I threw my hand over to greet it, tugged it from its cable, and checked.

Topher's message read, "god you are really bad at this you know?"

I squeezed the phone in my hand, a free finger hovering over the screen. My judgment was clouded. I had little idea how I wanted to reply – IF I could reply. Any progress I'd made toward uncovering clues was wiped. I could have sent Topher and Cruce another few messages, but perhaps I would have been retreading ground that availed nothing to me.

I noticed the percentage of power left in the phone's battery. A dreadful little '1' sat there in the corner.

 _There's some inconsistency to these 'reawakenings',_ I thought. _Once, my phone had no power. Then, it had enough to last me a few messages. Now, it only has one percent._

 _Not to mention the whole Sheffie thing..._

I was bumped out of thought when the phone opened up a browser without my input. I pulled my hand away from the screen, only for it to show an image of some kind of... cartoon mammal. I tunnel visioned. Another message popped up, and all I could see from it was a full caps "THIS", but the remainder of the battery was extinguished, returning my phone to its logo screen. I'd only taken in enough of that to recall that the mammal had white fur and big blue ears.

Part of me was amused that even Topher's newfound omnipotence was cut off by something as mundane as electricity, but the other part was seething for not getting the information I deserved. Oh, and some third part was still squeezing inside of me, so that was painful as hell.

I got up, went to the door, and opened it – Sheffield was already there, dressed nicely and stuff. I'd been quicker. He wasn't about to knock this time. In fact, he wasn't even fully at the door yet. I couldn't give him a reason to suspect I was going to get the generator for myself this time, being vastly more interested in what Topher had to tell me than my own well being.

 _After all, that well being seems to always wake up in the observatory again once things get too... difficult._

"Young Master Wright!" the butler exclaimed.

"G'morning, Sheffield – sorry; bathroom!" I lied – well, half-lied. It was a bother to awaken with a full bladder for the third time, so the agitation was present, but only to be used as a ruse anyway.

I broke into a light jog, hoping to turn a hallway corner without him following too closely. We both knew where all the bathrooms were, so if he saw me heading into the direction of the greenhouse, that would have given him reason for alarm.

He called out to me, "S-sir, do be mindful of your condition!"

…

A heavy air hung over the glass passage to the greenhouse, or perhaps that was just my body collapsing in on itself. I tried to keep to long, patient breaths, but they came out uncomfortably hot and sour, somehow. I had no reason to be unnerved by the powerlessness of the manor anymore, so the fear factor was losing its sway over me. I had to think that this physical exertion was what Topher wanted. She'd told me to 'scream' at one point, so the intent was malicious.

I walked backwards at one point, if not to see Johnny hurdling down the hall again, then to at least to make sure nobody was following me.

…

Surrounded by white and black sage again, the pollen and floral air doing no favors for my asthma, I found myself staring down at the small generator, wrapped in wire and metal barring. I'd thought this through about as thoroughly as anybody vaulting straight out of dream logic – and even then, dream logic had a roundabout way of conquering reality at this point. Rather fervently, at that...

 _I'm not sure how to get this to our grid without anybody noticing..._

 _Even if I make it all the way there, the noise would alert them for sure._

Pondering solutions, I turned around and took a seat over the generator. It was about as comfortable as a stack of books. That was to say, not at all. I still couldn't think quite clearly enough – I was more or less stuck on the image of a stack of books. It was a specific thing to conjure up in my mind, but then... so was that image on the phone. That was the whole reason I was here, so...

I squeezed my head between both hands. Doubt was afire beneath me, and I began roasting over it.

How was I supposed to get out of this? Why did she do this to me? She was always so bouncy and happy. How the hell could someone that carefree be so malevolent? Did she just not like how cold I seemed? It was that, wasn't it?

 _I shouldn't be so petty as to find an excuse for my mannerisms around others. In fact, I should have none at all. This was why I was... put here. A public school – somewhere to reach out and connect to people my age. Is that it? I-is... that why?_

I tried to simmer down the panic, but the doubt was simply as scalding hot as before, if not worse. I went as still as ice, thinking on the sounds of rain falling against the glassy roof and how, at any moment, that could have greeted me another time. This instance of thought may not have been real, but only the segue into the next sequence of actions I had to take in order to figure out why I was taking them at all.

Raindrops turned loud – no, something other!

Loud whirring. Mechanical sputtering.

The heat. The generator! It was on?!

"Oh it IS on! Holy shit!" I shouted over the clamor, hurling myself away from the live mechanism.

I spun. The machine was quite visibly shaking, fully roaring away, and with nothing to power. Its wire was still wrapped around it. It was loose, in more than one sense of the word. Swallowing away the feeling of clenched airways, I reacted on instinct, fearing more for the butlers' discovery of me than my own fascination, I reached out and pulled the wiring.

A few sparks flew from the object – from my fist! The pain was ephemeral, but as loud and present as the wailing of the machine. Betrayed by the thought of faulty insulation, I retracted my hand, encasing it in another; then, a crack. The wiring burst open, fraying violently. I stepped back, watching as ribbons of fire bled forth from the electrical wound.

Heat caressed my cheeks. Sweat rolled into my brow. Still holding one hand, I pressed the back of the other against my forehead, watching the fires consume the object, the leaves above it, the foliage around it. Smoke was pouring from the flames, collected by the roof. Smells of ozone, charcoal, dust; they all burned together in harmony, like voices in unison.

I felt as though I was playing the part of a troublesome child watching his own mistakes, but clearly I couldn't wallow in them for too long, lest they put me six feet under. There was a consistent, sharp twitching in the hand that had met with the shock, pestering me all the way through the burning greenhouse, then out back the way I came.

Breaths became short. Vision grew dim, even behind my glasses. I was sure I had them on, didn't I? Maybe they were clouding? I was sweating. It was hot everywhere, inside and out, and every bump my body made – every footstep was something so abrasive and heavy. Squeezed. I felt squeezed – no, compressed?!

This was different from my lungs' 'design flaw'. This was everywhere and everything about me. The pulsating in my hand spread across my whole arm, the respective shoulder, my neck. It spread so thin that it began to feel like static was worming within me.

I fell. I tumbled. Growing ever slightly numb, I could still feel the thuds and impacts my body made with the cemented corridor floor. I felt the burns of skidding along it.

One of my cheeks began to boil over with pain. I gritted both rows of teeth down, and suddenly the other cheek scorched as vehemently, my lips as a wire connecting the two. On top of it all, one squeezing of my body became two, as asthma returned to its throne and sat firmly over me, pressing me in like a helpless bottle of toothpaste. Somewhere in my struggle, my glasses fell away, but with both hands pushed into my cheeks, I thought it better to close my eyes and endure it all until somebody found me.

Tinnitus grew louder. I pictured it as being the electricity racing through me, burning my insides black, giving that useless waste of organic space the treatment it deserved.

Somewhere in there... footsteps raced for me. I looked, and I saw Johnny running at me, buttoning up his shirt in a hurry.

He didn't run through me. He stopped at me. He was so much bigger than me.

His voice rang over me like he and I were on opposite sides of an unseen surface of water.

He was shaking me, hands on my shoulders. I wanted to ask how his hands got so big, but I felt...

...truly detached, like my body was off doing one thing and my mind was thinking another. When I realized I was waking up again, I heard rain more clearly than ever before.

…

 **6**

It hurt, though. This time, I wasn't sure I wanted to open my eyes, but I was also relieved to know that I didn't cause any real damage. I could... get away with anything, so long as it fell within the span of a few moments hear in the manor. That may have been true, but I was also trapped, and it made me feel so scared that I wanted to... indeed, scream.

I was weak. I wasn't fit to be a Wright. The thought of a future terrified me. I wasn't brought up anything like my parents. The idea that I had to one day assume some kind of leadership over the Wright legacy, well... the anxiety welded me shut even tighter than I would have liked to admit to anyone, and that made it all the more horrifying. It was my own fault, always; but it haunted me into hysteria. It made things appear differently than in reality. It gave me nightmares.

At the worst of times, I felt like I could die under the pressure.

At the best of times, I had this manor. I had the wealth and the companionship of the butlers, and that was so stupid to overlook.

Maybe if I enjoyed what I'd been given in life a little differently, that would have been better. After all, what was right to me may have been wrong to somebody else, and... uh...

 _Hello? Wait, am I actually dead?_

 _Oh, that sucks._

"No, wait!" I called out – I could very well still hear the rain! And the clarity of it was so vibrant and nice that it... uh, actually made me... just notice my own... voice?

I flung myself up to my rear. Déjà vu blanketed me like fur. An unfamiliar tightness sensation claimed my chest, as the brightness of the clouded daylight gently greeted me. I gave a concise nod to myself, then I recalled the whereabouts of my glasses. I turned, reached for them, and before I had time to digest the idea that my hand and arm had all but become a stub of white, I fell in its direction. The whole room turned over on its head; then, I was on mine, an enormous puff of fluff falling around me, yanking me in its direction.

I took a noisy breath, flailing what little left there was of my limbs! My feet eventually did find the purchase to get me back right-side up.

I was sitting again, feet out before me. Little white, furry digits – barely a stub of what they used to be, and with no considerable 'leg' connecting them to my main, round body.

"Excuse me—what?!" I blurted. I threw an arm forth to find that it'd been given the same treatment as my legs. It was just a paw, and the shoulder was located elsewhere. More... forward-locked. Or something? My heady reflexively went numb, so I tried to touch it, but this, uh, paw thing could only reach up to my cheek, and when it did, the most divine, tickling sensation ensued. So I kept it there for a while, marveling at the delicate static tingling in my mouth, against my horribly disfigured overbite...

The phone rumbled...

I looked for it. I found a tail around me, mostly white, with a blue stripe along its backside, some pointy bits coming out of the curl. I gasped, attempting to lift myself partway. I put myself to all fours, trying to pin the tail down, but it flicked away from me. It went to the right, so I pivoted my body that way. I saw it whisk away again, so I turned and gave chase!

"Dammit, stop!" I yelled, air brushing through the fur on my face. It occurred to me that I was running in circles, and the next time I stumbled, it was, in fact, over the tail I'd been chasing. It was mine. I should have known as much. Everything was hazy. Static in my head. So lovely. But! I did this! This was a thing I did! Squirrels! I chased them! Damn things always crowded the yard, but they were... pretty cute, too.

Still, I had this fluffy thing in both paws, so I... leaned in and gave it a nibble. Soft. So incredibly, beautifully soft. I chanced a lick, and it felt smooth against my tongue, so I did another, and another, 'till I coiled myself up, belly against the rug with my feet and paws tucked underneath me. I kept on grooming it closer to perfection, even if I did have a long ways to go. That was fine. What was more important anyway?

An elated purr welled up inside of me while I went on with my business, letting my eyes close as my tongue lapped over the new frontier that was my body.

But then-

A few quick, gentle knocks.

"Young Master Wright," came an elderly gentleman's voice, muffled from behind the door. "Pardon my intrusion; are you awake?"

Me head and ears flew up.

"Uh-!" I squealed, masking my voice underneath a corrective cough, but even that sounded much higher pitched than normal.

There was no sense in hiding this, especially not if things were destined to replay again. My troubles were far from over, and I needed all the help I was going to get if I wanted to eject myself from Topher's Groundhog Day fantasy. Although, now I knew that things were a tad more complicated than that. Good! I could use this turn of events to my advantage.

For what remained of it, I felt my brow go stern. I must have looked ridiculous, but I'd have hoped some level of decisiveness was portrayed in my face.

"Come on in, Sheffield," I squeaked.

"Oh? That's quite the voice you're putting on, young Mast-"—he opened the door and froze a moment, his mouth nearly having completed the title. Sheffield was gargantuan now – from where I lay, anyway. Everything about him, from his tux to the toiling shock in his poor, wrinkled face, was titanic and intimidating, but I stayed coiled and tight, only to hear a familiar, frantic question. "OH MY GIDDY AUNT, WHAT'S HAPPENED TO YOU?!"

…

 **Just outside the observatory**

"And that, gentlemen," I stopped in place, having been pacing in front of the two. I looked up at the bewildered butlers. "Sums up my past few 'mornings'."

"I'd say I don't believe it, but," Johnny began. "Th-the proof I have right here is almost an alibi!"

"Isn't it?" I felt myself grin. Once again, that pride for our fledgling butler nestled up next to my heart. "I'm glad you feel that way."

"While I do believe you, Young Master," Sheffield spoke up. "I fail to see how we are to rectify the paranormal circumstances of the manor. Why, such a thing has never happened before!"

"I'm loathe to say it," I said, a paw touching under my round chin. "But I'm thinking about escaping. The only one affected by this is me, and I know who's responsible."

"That's Topher, correct?" Johnny recalled.

"She's the prime suspect, and I'd try to contact her," I confirmed, looking back into the room with my phone, blocked out by this behemoth of a tail. Had I wanted to, I couldn't even text her anymore, given the lack of proper digits; however, I may have been... slightly ashamed to admit that. "But our power is out, as is my phone's battery."

"Certainly there are other means of doing so," Sheffield raised. "John? Is your phone available?"

"Yes, but I don't have Topher's contact information," he said, folding his hands together at his chest, stammering with panic.

"Well now," Sheffield quipped. "May I ask what Topher's motives are?"

"I-I don't really..." I winced, not because anything hurt too profoundly, but because of the big picture of Topher's goal. "He told me he wanted to make me scream, so that I could... sing."

"That wouldn't help you," Johnny said. "And neither would turning you into a Pokémon."

I blinked.

"What?" I asked him.

"Eh..." he bumbled, putting his hands to his collar and fiddling with it. I noticed his shirt happened to be fully buttoned for the first time.

 _Wait. This is the first time I've seen him today, but every other time, even IF it's an illusion..._

 _...his top button is never done._

"Johnny," I gasped. "I'm a Pokémon?"

"I... guess? You kind of look like one," he shrugged his shoulders. That wasn't convincing me of anything.

"Why don't we... all walk together? Down to the greenhouse?" I suggested, giving the younger butler a long, skeptical glare, to which he responded by turning the other cheek.

"That is all well, but," Sheffield spoke. "I fear your asthma is still present, even in your new, petite body. Would you like me to carry you, sir?"

I cringed at the thought. My ears fell flat and I found myself replicating Johnny's look away. Mortified by the idea of having to be taxi'd by hand in my worst moments, I was also somewhat enchanted by it. Such a forbidden thing, and Sheffield outright suggested it without so much as a second thought. It wasn't like him. These two, for as capable as they were, seemed to be out of place somehow.

I was growing weary and worried that my suspicions were beginning to fall in all the wrong places. Perhaps I was creating suspicion where it did not need to be created. After all, I had no idea what was real anymore, and that was growing into a crippling fear. Now more vulnerable than ever, I was finding it difficult to trust anything.

Declining Sheffield's offer with an unintended bite to my verbiage, I carried through the manor once more, this time all three of us present and accounted for. I kept an eye on them the whole way, but nothing unusual presented itself, like the world around me was trying extra hard to conceal its true colors... now that I'd gone and absorbed the lot of them.

…

Everything was going perfectly. There were no interruptions, illusions, or otherwise. Then, passing through the now much stronger scents of the greenhouse, there sat a body, fully dressed in a long-sleeve white undershirt and black waistcoat, fedora, slacks, shoes – it was me, and the generator seemed to be missing. In place of that, there was a stool similar to the one from the audio room.

Put against a backdrop of gigantic flora all leaning forward, as if to claim the body into its sylvan jaws, it was as grand a shock as shock value could provoke. The body was slumped, an electric guitar unmanned in front of it. I couldn't see its face, even down as low as I was. What little heart I had inside of me was pumping fast. I dropped to all fours and shrunk away from the scene, hanging my tail high overhead, as if to shield me...

"Knock it off, Topher," I cried out, feeble. "I-I don't have... the stamina anymore. Just stop, please..."

 _So weak. I have to plead. I have to get down and beg, reduced to nothing but this puny cartoon squirrel._

I remembered the smell of the smoke, and so I heaved with fear. I wanted to shove my face into the ground and go back to sleep. Somewhere, in the quiet of sleep, my body could detach, and I didn't feel the pain, the tightness... Not anymore. That was what I longed for. The voice I wanted to expel in song was only a projection, when in reality it was just a ghost calling this shell a home.

"If you're trying to help me, it's not working," I continued, lifting my gaze slightly. "But if you're trying to humiliate me, then congratulations. You've hit your checkmate. How do I... convince you that you've won?"

No response. Nobody said a thing.

I thought to speak again, but the body lifted its head. It played out slowly, moving to the effect of a slideshow. Only the head and neck moved, all the rest as stiff as rigor mortis. Once it revealed its face to me, I could at very least say that it wasn't mine, or what mine used to be. Underneath the glasses were scribbled circles acting as eyes, a messy squiggle for a mouth, no nose, and no facial hair. From here, it was difficult to see, but the complexion of the face led me to believe that it wasn't skin at all, but fabric.

Unsettled, I cried out another 'stop'. Its head tilted to one side, once more in that stuttery, slideshow-esque manner that made it all the more jarring. Another 'stop' left my lips, higher in volume. Before a third left my small mouth, I...

"No..." I whimpered. "You're not going to get that from me. I won't scream."

No response.

"I won't...!" I growled.

Another tilt of the head, this time crumpling its neck inward on itself, before springing it back up to the desired angle. The neck seemed to elongate and bend the whole head forward.

"You're not asleep, Nick," I heard a man's voice say. It was Sheffield, but hearing him say my first name was... uncanny. I looked up to the old man at my side, his arms behind his back, a menacing shadow playing over his face as he looked down seemingly forever at me. "You are dead."

Somebody put something over me and I nearly jumped out of my skin and fur. It was warm, though, and gentle. Johnny's presence grew closer. I deduced it was his hand against my back. His minty breath blew toward me the moment my face found his. He was smiling, cool and composed, unlike... any time before... I was... lost in his confidence...

"That's why you can't wake up," he hummed. "I can't even imagine how tough it must be try and face what put you in there to start with..."

"Johnny-!" I gasped, yet for once steady of breath.

"We gotcha, Nicksie-boo~!" Johnny sang. Somebody else's voice mumbled in a background that didn't even exist. "What? Oh! That?! Hahaha, well, I guess everything comes around full circle, huh?"

 _Full circle?_

"What the hell is happening right now?!" I broke free of the trance, the line snapping almost audibly in my own mind. I darted away from Johnny's hand and backed myself up against the wall of a planter, standing on two feet with both arms out as far as I could get them. "Topher, are you possessing them?! D-did YOU die?! DUDE!"

"Wait, Nick! You're so close! I can't-!" Johnny's mouth kept moving, but his voice was cut off as cleanly as if somebody had hit a universal mute button.

No. Not universal. The sound of static and feedback remained. It threatened the quiet air with a burst of noise, some manner of crescendo, or otherwise. I was afraid of it. I was afraid of the noise that might escape the near-silence, whatever it may have been.

The effigy of me was standing now, undeterred by the weight of the guitar. Sheffield and Johnny were frozen, as was I.

Its head was twitching.

Beneath the lightly popping static feedback came a voice. It was masked deep beneath the scratchy audio, but I could hear it. One of my ears flicked, then both fell flat against my skull. I didn't want it. I didn't.

The face of the effigy twitched more wildly, the neck folding, the glasses and fedora being flung off into a planter somewhere.

The shrieking voice grew louder and louder, steadily increasing in volume.

The face was shaking violently – no, the whole head was thrashing. The air swung in accordance to every volatile, jerking motion, until it all became too hard to keep up with. Any kind of motion of the neck with that much speed would have given the term breakneck every ounce of its worth.

The shriek became deafening. It became my voice, modulated beneath audio recording equipment.

All angles. All facets of sensation. All points of being. Everything was that voice, pushing me in from all conceivable notions – concrete or abstract.

It rang on and on and on and on for so loud, that it seemed to become... the norm... for all of existence.

It was my voice, loud as could be. I heard it, and I was still here. I was... here, somewhere, but the whole of my being was... elsewhere. No. Not elsewhere. It was so close. It was inside of... me?

That scream forced its way into me and became me, everything I stood for, everything I wanted.

But it did get very, very quiet.

The quiet found its way into my head, and some clumsy shuffling through soft fabric after that, my eyes closed, and a quiet embrace soon had me. Falling asleep was the easiest it had ever been. It was as a cotton embrace...

...

 _No... that's not right._

My eyes were opening.

Waking UP was the easiest it had ever been.

I was wearing some kind of costume. It wasn't Halloween, and there was no other such special occasion. The costume fit me, but I couldn't help but feel disproportionate to everybody else, and furthermore, I couldn't answer why.

I was being pulled somewhere, but it wasn't that there were hands pulling me. I deduced that hands were the only things in the universe that could pull. No gravity. No pressure.

I was almost okay with this...

I was sitting down. I was out of breath, but the pressure was all gone. I was sitting, and for once, it didn't feel like something heavy was sitting on me.

All around me were unfamiliar faces, all looking at me, soulless, beady and bug-eyed. I looked at the soft ground and my feet weren't even there.

…

I could conclude that the figures around me were LIKE me in some capacity, if not a little bit more lifeless. There was one in front of me, however, that did have that 'spark' of life. Very obviously feminine in her face and gestures, the feline-like creature was sitting with her small legs crossed, little arms over those legs, and two tremendously fluffy tails out at either side behind her. She wore a coat of blue fur, white at her neck and hair, and had rather lovely jade eyes staring right back at me – well, whipping from my eyes to some weight that slightly pushed down on me from above.

"No way," she uttered, slapping both cheeks between the white tips of her pointy paws. Her face got a bit pushed inwards, but at least it wasn't as messed up as my effigies. I shuddered to think of that thing again. "WHOA!"

"Could you maybe exclaim in more detail?" I heard Cruce's voice behind her – actually, he was standing over her. He was massive. This whole room was massive. Their room.

Cruce and Topher.

"HE LIIIIIVES!" she shouted dramatically, before composing herself, smiling, and lifting her head back, bonking it into Cruce's legs and looking up at him. "How's that? Goochie-goo~?"

"Would somebody like to tell me the meaning of all of this?!" I asked, but nothing moved – that was, no lips. I thought to ask something to this effect, and it sort of... leaked out of me, from somewhere. Was it my bottom? I scanned as low as I could, but all I could make out was a white sheet of soft material, some splayed fabric against their distastefully colored carpet.

"HO shit!" Cruce alerted and jumped, parting his legs. The feline girl whimpered in objection, before just falling backward altogether. "Aaaay, we got ourselves a live one over here!"

"If my arms were a little longer," the feline started, thrusting both of her arms straight up, pointing to Cruce's... taint. "I could punch you STUH-RAIGHT in the balls right now..."

"You wouldn't hurt something so valuable to you," Cruce retorted.

"You're probably right..." the other sighed.

…

After having Cruce assist me in the briefest way he could, placing me on their... questionably clean bed, I had a fairly decent view of the rest of their bizarre, twofold room, weight equipment on one end and stuffed animals in the other. Needless to say, it wasn't difficult to tell which side I had been lost within. The question remained: How did I end up there? What was I doing to become this husk of rags?

According to their sliding closet door, doubling as a mirror, I was not too different from the squirrel I'd transformed into in the manor; however, I had features resembling that effigy of myself. My eyes were as squiggles, as was my mouth, and my head leaned independently of where I was looking. Two tiny dots on my chest revealed to me that I wasn't looking through my head at all, but those dots exactly, although I'd tried to superimpose the position of my eyesight to something a little higher. It gave me a headache, or something equivalent to one anyway, but I couldn't say I had the urge to cough or wheeze or breath in short, afflicted bursts anymore.

Topher hopped up onto the bed next to me, at first doing so with four legs, then falling forward and kicking her back legs up, while resting her head in her front paws and grinning at me, swaying her elegant tails to and fro.

"I'm a Meowstic, and you're a Mimikyu!" she announced. "We're both Pokémon. Yeah~? Cool, huh?!"

"Forgive me if I have a hard time agreeing with that," I sulked. I could barely emote, save the illusion of a brow I could concoct with my 'eyes'. There must have been some other way in revealing my feelings of the situation. Perhaps I could speak a bit further than in words. Expressions? It would hardly be any different than the faces I had used when texting Cruce. I thought of a shape, following an idea... "I'm not as emphatic to the idea of frivolity as you two may be. **-_-** "

Cruce instinctively reached for his face, feeling around it with both hands, then proceeding to look in both directions. I had to assume my thoughts reached him.

"Wow, you got all kinds of telepalabapffffbptpthtalathic tricks, don't'cha~?" Topher chirped (and spat a little bit). "Maybe if I knew 'em, it wouldn't have been so hard to get through to you..."

The eyes at my chest blinked.

"Get through to me? Tell me everything, Topher, **:o** " I thought to her, reminded by her playful attitude that she was very well the one responsible for my plight.

Despite that, it seemed like she wanted to help me. I eagerly awaited what excuses or reasons came from her.

I would have been more doubtful, but she was like me: a Pokémon.

…

"You see, uhm...

I'm a psychic-type.

I can kinda get into your mind, you know? Since I knew you still had a mind, I knew you were still alive-ish. It was really difficult...

I had to REALLY focus. It was scary in there, Nick. You thought some scary things, but I could juuuust about break through to you."

"I see.

You were responsible for the illusions, the phantasms... **o-o** "

"Was I? I'm sorry. It might'a been a byproduct of my mind-stuff.

I only ever wanted to get into those cognitive versions of your butlers.

Maybe I got some details wrong? I'm sorry, Nick..."

"Ah... That was you.

Suddenly, Johnny's change in mannerisms become clear. As with Sheffield.

It doesn't change that you still caused me harm. You wanted to see me suffer. Why is that? **-** "

"Huh? N-no, Nick! Never!

I didn't want to hurt you. Ohmygosh, I'm so sorry if I did – really!

I didn't think telepathy was that hard to control. I wasn't even aware that I could make illusions."

"Hmph. The messages on the phone seemed very clear and concise to me.

You wanted my asthma to claim my life. It's obvious.

Yet you won't admit that? **-_-** "

"You're wrong, though! You were already, like, uh, dead...

The only phone stuff I ever did was research on what you could have been, and that was in REAL life!

You're a Mimikyu, so... you were still... kind of alive.

Did... even weirder stuff happen in your dream-vision-thing?"

"Yes, even though I still have no idea what's real.

I know that you sent me some nerve-wracking messages.

Each messages pointed out that you were aware of everything that was happening around me.

In any case, none of this explains how I got HERE, Topher. **-** "

"Hehe, your little mind-faces are kind of cute...

I promise it was never my intention to scare you, only guide you out of your death-nightmare thing.

If somebody was sending you weird messages, then either I really need to learn how to manage my powers better, or...

...that wasn't me."

"I...

I value our friendship. I want to believe you were helping me.

Yet, I find that a trying task.

Although, if you did end up killing me, and THIS is the result, you've left me in a position so new and unheard of that I cannot help but be intrigued. **:)** "

"Dude, I didn't kill you!

Your ASTHMA killed you!

Somebody just... turned you into that, like they did to me, and I took you home with us.

You looked good in the pile of plushies though! You're welcome to go back there anytime~!"

"Aah, I... see. When was this? My death?"

"In the woods. We were hanging out together outside because all the power in town was out, but...

Just as we were leaving, you collapsed.

You WERE coughing a lot that day...

We tried to get you up, but you didn't move...

Cruce started crying.

Then, YOU started changing."

"Yeah I cried, so what?!

I like rich boy!

That's my homie, man..."

"I-I don't... understand. Not fully.

Topher, Cruce... If that's really what happened, I'm sorry you had to witness it.

I'm not sure my mind can process all of this at once. **;-;** "

"That's okay. Your mind's a TOUGH nut to crack.

Take it easy, Nick. You're with us now, and we're in it together!

Except Cruce; screw that guy~."

"Go lick your own nuts, cat."

"No can do. I don't want to make you feel left out.

"You two... Sheesh.

I have another question, and then I would like to sleep... for real. **~_~** "

"Fire away!"

"I don't believe in ghosts, so...

What does that make me?"

"Well, funny-buns, it don't matter what you believe in!

You're a ghost-type! That's what the internet says!

Just, somebody REALLY didn't want you to disappear forever.

I'd like to say that somebody is me, but that somebody turned you into a l'il ghosty and put weird psychedelic nonsense into your dead fever dream!

Or maybe you just couldn't come to grips with the fact that you were really dead. Huh."

"O-okay Topher, that's... quite enough.

I cannot say I'm fully satisfied with this exposition, but my head feels heavy and full."

"Yeeeh, I can see that. It's all leaning to one side 'n stuff~."

"Haha, so it is!

Very well. Allow me this sleepover, if you would.

I appreciate what you've done for me, and I would like to try and return the favor.

Nonetheless, I am extremely interested to see where all of this goes now... **^-^** "

…

The quiet of sleep consumed me once more that night – a different night though it was. Which night, I couldn't be sure, but the night was comfortable and clear, and though it was spent outside of the manor, it was spent among friends. Truth be told, I did not sleep as easily as I would have thought. Well, being a ghost and everything, I had a few minor details to make amends with, next to sleeping with a couple of frisky cousins who liked to cuddle up nice and warm – Topher all but buried herself underneath the blankets! I preferred a distant corner at the foot of the bed, and was just fine sleeping upright.

 _Up... Wright._

 _I won't let this change of events stop who I'm striving to become. Perhaps it's for the better. Death will not take me._

 _How enlightening. I've surpassed death. Knowing there's still so much more I can rise and shine to – well...!_

 _That's rather enrapturing._

 _Let's move this tale along, shall we?_ _ **^-^**_


End file.
